At least 13 people have died in suicide attacks on churches in Indonesia’s second-largest city, carried out by a family of six that included two young children, police said.

All six family members were killed in the attacks in Surabaya and at least 41 people were injured, in acts that Indonesia’s president condemned as “barbaric”.

The bombings were the worst to target churches in Indonesia since a series of attacks on Christmas Eve in 2000 killed 15 people and wounded nearly 100. Religious minorities in Indonesia, especially Christians, have been repeatedly targeted by militants.

Mr Karnavian said the family had returned to Indonesia from Syria, where until recently the Islamic State group controlled significant territory.

The extremist group claimed responsibility for Sunday’s attacks in a statement carried by its Aamaq news agency.

The first attack struck the Santa Maria Roman Catholic Church in Surabaya, police spokesman Frans Barung Mangera told reporters. That blast was followed by a second explosion minutes later at the Christian Church of Diponegoro and a third at the city’s Pantekosta Church.

“At first officers blocked them in front of the churchyard, but the woman ignored them and forced her way inside. Suddenly she hugged a civilian then (the bomb) exploded,” said the witness, a security guard who identified himself as Antonius.

Mr Mangera said three unexploded homemade bombs – two at the Pantekosta church and one at the Diponegoro church – were detonated by a bomb squad.

Shattered glass and chunks of concrete littered the entrance of the Santa Maria Church, which was sealed off by armed police. Rescue personnel treated victims at a nearby field while officers inspected wrecked motorcycles in the car park that had been burned in the explosion.

A street merchant outside the church said she was blown several metres by the blast.

“I saw two men riding a motorbike force their way into the churchyard. One was wearing black pants and one with a backpack,” said the merchant, Samsia, who uses a single name. “Soon after that the explosion happened.”

President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo visited the scenes of the attacks and described them as “cowardly actions” that were “very barbaric and beyond the limit of humanity”.

In Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital, the Indonesian Church Association condemned the attacks.

“We are angry,” said Gormar Gultom, an official with the association, who urged people to let the police investigation take its course.

Separately, national police spokesman Setyo Wasisto said police fatally shot four suspected militants and arrested two others early on Sunday in West Java towns. It was not clear whether the shootings were connected to the church attacks.

“They have trained in order to attack police,” Mr Wasisto said, identifying the militants as members of Jemaah Anshorut Daulah, an Islamic State group-affiliated network of about two dozen extremist groups that has been implicated in a number of attacks in Indonesia over the past year.

Jakarta police placed the capital and surrounding areas on high alert, while the transportation ministry warned airports to be on guard.

The church attacks came days after police ended a hostage-taking ordeal by imprisoned Islamic militants at a detention centre near Jakarta in which six officers and three inmates died. IS claimed responsibility.

Indonesia has carried out a sustained crackdown on militants since bombings by al Qaida-affiliated radicals in Bali in 2002 killed 202 people. In recent years, the country has faced a new threat as the rise of IS in the Middle East invigorated local militant networks.

Christians, many of whom are from the ethnic Chinese minority, make up about 9% of Indonesia’s 260 million people.

A family of Islamist militants in Indonesia carried an eight-year-old into a suicide bomb attack against police in Surabaya on Monday, a day after another militant family killed 13 people in suicide attacks on three churches in the same city.

The suicide bombers rode two motorbikes up to a checkpoint outside a police station and blew themselves up, Tito Karnavian, the police chief in Indonesia’s second-largest city, told a news conference.

He said the child survived the explosion, and CCTV footage showed a child stumbling around in the aftermath.

Four officers and six civilians were wounded in the attack, East Java police spokesman Frans Barung Mangera said.

President Joko Widodo branded the attacks in Surabaya the “act of cowards“, and pledged to push through a new anti-terrorism bill to combat Islamist militant networks.

Knife attack in Paris, church bombings in Indonesia. Everyday we hear of more Muslim inspired terrorism. And the media continues to push Islam as the religion of peace. Thankfully Trump won the election and he’s trying to slow down the immigration of these savage into this country.

The media is still no closer to honestly addressing this issue. When describing the victims at least the fearful media did refer to them as Christians, but when stating whom the six perpetrators where they call them “militants” and the others who have committed similar murders in the past are labeled “extremists”, why is this? Call them MUSLIMS, MOSLEMS, MOHAMEDANS, or followers of ISLAM but be honest and accurate.

The “religion” of peace strikes again! The depravity of these savages knows no bounds. They are a satanic cult of pedophilia, mysogeny, and evil that the world must stand against. They cannot be allowed to exist!

More dishonest misleading and mislabeled media headlines. This had nothing to do with “suicide”. Suicide is a sin which prohibits Moslems entrance to Paradise, this was “Jihad”, an act that guarantees any Moslems willing to use their own bones as shrapnel in order to kill non-moslems literally a red carpet reception to the virgin sex filled afterlife. Knife attack, lone wolf attack, van attack, pressure cooker attack, media please cut the crap, all together now…jihad attack, jihad attack, jihad attack!!! Correct terminology matters, start using it.

“STOCKING” Like when a
farmer stocks a pond with bass or he stocks a field with quail. Obama has “STOCKED” this country with Muslims and other undesirables knowing
full well that they will multiply like rats and wild hogs AT TAXPAYER EXPENSE
and cause mayhem forever into the future of this country.
Could there be any more proof that Obama hated this country.
He also encouraged insane moslems the world over to help bring the mhadi back to insure islamic world domination.